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Rethinking and Rebuilding Social Cohesion: Engaging Young Syrian Refugees Project

On Saturday 1st July 2017, the Foundation for Science, Technology, Civilisation UK (FSTC UK), Rethink Rebuild Society (RR) and AMAL partnered up to deliver the second part of the “Rethinking and Rebuilding Social Cohesion: Engaging Young Syrian Refugees Project”. This project aims to celebrate the diversity of Muslim cultures through art, education and intellectual inquiry by disseminating the scientific, technological and civilisational advances made by them.

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On Saturday 1st July 2017, the Foundation for Science, Technology, Civilisation UK (FSTC UK), Rethink Rebuild Society (RR)[1] and AMAL[2] partnered up to deliver the second part of the “Rethinking and Rebuilding Social Cohesion: Engaging Young Syrian Refugees Project”.

This project aims to celebrate the diversity of Muslim cultures through art, education and intellectual inquiry by disseminating the scientific, technological and civilisational advances made by them. What is more, it wishes to enable enlightening interactions which have had an impact on modern civilisation within Muslim communities and wider society. We believe this will help lessen inferiority complexes while also enabling them to feel at home in the UK. It also intends to promote marginalised voices that are not adequately represented in the mainstream.

While the first session of this project featured contributions from Muslim Civilisation to Sports, the second featured an interactive workshop on Science. The sessions featured an array of young male and female participants from differing ages and backgrounds in Syria, all were refugees and are held at RR Headquarters.

In this session, participants learnt about renowned figures such as Ibn al-Haytham who discovered that “light travels in straight lines”, Abbas ibn Firnas perhaps the first person to make a real attempt to construct a flying machine and take it into the air, a nurse named Rufaydah al-Aslamiyyah and a botanist called Ibn al-Baytar.

The session featured various games, experiments and other exercises and during the question and answer session, the majority of the feedback was positive with participants asking if the sessions could be more frequent. In addition, young people drew smiley faces on their anonymous feedback papers and left comments such as “the session was useful and interesting I enjoyed a lot” and others stating they were “really happy about today”.

Subsequent sessions on Technology, Art & Design alongside an Interactive Participant Led Reprise are to follow.

[1] Rethink Rebuild Society (RR) is a Manchester-based non-profit organisation that works towards improving the lives of Syrians in the UK and helping them become positively established within British society. Visit: http://rrsoc.org for more information

[2] Amal provides opportunities for people in Britain, regardless of their faith or beliefs, to come together and explore the rich diversity of Muslim cultures and arts including storytelling, visual arts, theatre, poetry, music, dance and film. Visit: http://amal.org.uk for more information